Stakeholders and opinion leaders of the Niger Delta region under the aegis of Niger Delta Democratic Alliance (NDDA), have called on the Federal Government to immediately return and retain Pa Harold Dapa Biriye’s name on the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) permanent building to avoid crisis.

A statement by the Chairman of NDDA, Success Jack, made available to The Guardian yesterday in Calabar said: “Pa Biriye’s regional leadership to national and global levels over the decades, his support and direction to the Obasanjo Government, in handling the Niger Delta question was the reason for naming the NDDC building after him.

“Consequently, Secretary to Government of the Federation and the Minister of Niger Delta Affairs should reflect this change on the building immediately, to avoid evoking the wrong emotions from our people.

“Pa Biriye’s stout patriotic posture, which saw him leading the Niger Delta region pre and post independence, into alliances with other national leaders and regions, like Tafawa Balewa, Ahmadu Bello etc, has not been given the proper recognition like his pairs and contemporaries.”

The group said the resolution of the Senate via Senator Seriake Dickson’s motion, over naming the NDDC building after Pa Biriye as it had always been, “is a step in the right direction. That Pa Biriye in whose symbolic shadows of national cohesion, unity and development, intellectual and ideological positions, upon which the Niger Delta agitation for fairness,equity and justice in the national inclusion equation has been standing for decades, needs a bold national endorsement”.